The Beatings will continue until Morale improves...

So its been a long time coming, finally the Astral Wolves have a new unit to add to what is a a pretty solid army so far. Before I unveil the first of 5 new models I would like to give you a little back story as to what I had originally planned.

The Astral Wolves was at first intended to be a purely Chaos undivided force, with no special marks of the 4 Chaos gods amongst them... Hell my first idea was to do Black Legion... then I thought why not a sub division of the Black Legion... then I thought why dont i just paint an army of smurfs and cry if someone bags Calgar. At this same time my hobby partner and best friend was starting a Space wolf army and having read the fluff about the wolf of fenris I thought to myself  "Lets stick it to the Space Wolf fan boys who ever they may be!" and thus was born the Astral Wolves, a pirate chapter founded by the red corsairs from the traitors of the Wolf of Fenris. 

Somewhere along this path I decided to represent every dark power in my army... then came the call of Khorne, Oh what a powerful call that was, Suddenly I find myself planning a Khornate army. The whole time however JP kept saying to me "do Nurgle, do plague marines" 

Well just recently I found myself having to put together a 1200 pt list for Arcanacon, and lo the Khornate theme just wasnt working out so well for me.... I needed some extra firepower and some survivable yet cheap troops to field midrange. And so here we find the latest edition to an ever growing force, The first of a unit of 5 plague marines!

The photo does this model no justice, nor does it do the green justice... which for your information is a base coat of Vallejo 'Tail light green' with a heavy dry brush of GW "rotting flesh" and a medium wash of GW Thraka Green over the top!

Like the rest of the army, black, red and gold have been kept as the primary theme, however Green is major feature of all these guys, as red is he major theme of the Khorne Berzerkers and black is the theme for the CSM squad. And now I find myself wanting to return to my original idea, perhaps a unit of 1k sons and the raptors im thinking will be upgraded to pink slannesh fiends! 

In other news "A fair drubbing was handed down" as JP would put it on Friday. PapaJJ said it best when he said my run of bad luck was at an end, Truer words could not have been spoken my friend! Friday saw the Astral Wolves tear through an unprepared Raven Wing of the Uhlfen Templars! They shall not underestimate the power of the Dark Gods again!

Ready for drop pods... and totally not hiding at all but bravely standing behind some stuff!

Gajme 1 saw me tear into them with glee abandon, making impossible dice odds to rip them a new one, Game 2 was a little closer with JP's Rifleman Dread being full of win... seriously! I suggested this setup to him a while ago and now he is running with it, even though im afraid it will make mince out of my rhinos but what the hell, if he can make one snotty uptight pretentious bastards day a living hell with it (and not me you smarmy...) then I will be a happy man!

this was the lay of the board at the start of my turn... no prizes for guessing what the vindicator did... and well...!

Game 3... well I thought JP had a good start and he was just getting the hang of his pod deployment but pure fatigue and apathy took the day to a forfeit victory... no skulls from a forfeit... Khorne was not pleased!

Lukas and the Blood Frenzied (Kharn  and Zerkers) are forced to walk, what you cant see however is a couple of squads of assault marines nearby who got to taste chaos steel!

All of our recent games I might add have been played at the new store in Melbourne "Realm of Legends" and I cant stress enough that if your in melbourne and not playing here either you cant get there or your afraid of meeting people... oh wait we play 40k and paint for fun... allright you can be a little scared but get on down there for game! And if your there on Fridays (maybe sunday this week) then perhaps you can meet ME! oh and JP... Hell I would love the chance to play some of the armys I see on the blogosphere!

And in other news, it would happen that good luck runs in packs, with a fantastic offer from my University to study Engineering: Mechatronics as of next year!  With my upcoming trip to the land of the rising sun less the 2 weeks away I must say im a happy boy indeed!

As always good gaming,

Von Drakin

Reclaiming the wasteland.

So here I am... minding my own business when the school year just comes to a stop. Not one of those fancy I've got brakes stops, no sir. But a good old fashioned I just hit a Mercedes stops... sudden and you know the other guy's car is going to cost you... a lot.

So there I was, when a shining beacon shone out at me. A chance to hobby unimpeded, YAY! but oh wait what fair daemon stands there before me? Why its the latest Fallout game... New Vegas thy name is Legion.

So in short no hobby has been done. Thanks to circumstance no games have been played (on the table that is) and here I stand a week later, shaky at the knees having finished Fallout: New Vegas. In case your wondering Fallout is good... Its really good. Just dont plan anything with your life until the experience has had time to finish.

In other news I have signed up to play at one of the premier tournaments in Melbourne, Arcanacon. Regretfully my friend had to sign me up and didn't do so until 8 minutes had passed from the sign up opening time. So im currently player 169 out of 140 spots to play. I can only hope that people drop out like flies because I didnt get to play last year either.

An ode to Papa JJ

Well where does one start with a review of a blog, not just a blog but also the man... we start i guess at the beginning...

First the earth cooled, Then the dinosaurs came... 

But in all seriousness lets get to know this man.

Thats Papa JJ on the left! Joe Ortoza on the right. people in the backgound..?

Jason (aka. Papa JJ) was born on March the 6^th 1977, Disco was at its height and Saturday night fever was soon to be released. As it happens the very day before this auspicious event, Formula One driver Tom Pryce died after colliding with a track marshal... could Papa JJ be the reincarnated soul of either of these gents? No... Probably not but it’s a nice thought anyway.

So we fast forward, to May 23^rd 2009. It was a Saturday night and who knows why (Papa JJ we hope) but Dice Rolla was born. In fact Saturday seems to be a current theme... I digress. It was from this humble beginning that we start to see glimmers of true brilliance emerge with it seems a plethora of hobby updates to come. One hundred and ninety four posts later and we find ourselves at the present.

I would if I could list each and everyone of them for you the reader but let me just say, Papa JJ posts with regularity, he often has something of value to say and some of his posts have been epic to say the least. If we all could write as much or as well as he does the interwebs would be... more wordy, but more... thingyer... brain thing... like a headache with pictures.

Anyway I have chosen a few projects to showcase here to give you an example of why I really do like Dice Rolla, and not just cause I said I would!

First off I would love to mention the Sea Horses of Annihilation! While we have yet to see more of this chapter I love it, further more it has the full approval of my Girlfriend (who loves sea horses) and was the very first post I ever read on this Blog, in fact it was the title that got my attention to Dice Rolla to begin with.

What a cute little fella!

Next off I would like to showcase this WIP of a cityscape Papa JJ has been Building, All I can say is its a real pity an ocean separates us my friend because I would love the chance to romp a few Khorne Zerkers through that battlefield! 

I can see my house from here!

And lastly in a triumvirate of celebration this article really got me, Rogue Trader Ultra Marines, wow. It was rogue trader that first got me into gaming, be that as it may I stopped soon after for a paltry 15 years I still remember seeing them and wanting some of my own. Turns out I did buy some and there they sit unmade to this day... one day... 

Old Skool Glory!

Either way I love it, great way to get the old models back in action!

Even after all of that I have by no means scratched the surface of Dice Rolla, From trips around the U.S to game reports, a few giveaways (how about winning that Copperhead... especially considering it was Dice Rolla that linked me to the construction blog!) to gaming advice and everything in between, If you love the Simpsons check out the Imperial Guard project with a fully painted Mr. Burns (you need to make Canary M Burns to take the rap btw). Also the Killzone team with a distinct Lovecraft style, very nice! 

So there you have it, Papa JJ you have yet to pick your model or what you would like done to it, I hope you realise I actually intend to ship it to you when it’s done... I mean what’s the point of me having it after all!

Oh and a computer called him a nerd, true story!

As Always peeps Good Gaming

Von Drakin

The Interwebs is procrastination...

So I have now completed one subject, done, dusted and hopefully i have passed well... time will tell. I have another big exam to sit on wednesday, an essay to compose and a final physics exam on the 28th... Until then im afraid its study and procrastination. Unfortunately I cant qualify painting as valid procrastination, where as interweb trawling... welll im doing "research" (sure lets call it that) and if I happen to stumble across someone's blog in the meantime (so many good ones to choose from) then that's a casualty of the study process.

Anyways until I get painting again you can amuse your self with this picture of my favourite I can has cheezeburger!

**as an aside, to give myself and all of you something to look forward to, when I do get back to painting, the first person to name the movie this picture parodies will get a special model painted in their honour (in space marine, chaos marine, rogue trader marine, tau, dark eldar, genestealer or ork flavours) in whatever scheme they like, a special expose on their blog of choice and a link to that blog topside in pride of place on my blog!